Mark Kolakowski

Mark Kolakowski has had a long multidisciplinary career. His higher education includes an A.B. magna cum laude in economics from Harvard and an M.B.A. in finance from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

At AT&T, he developed a comprehensive system of econometric models to forecast the impact of the 1984 Bell System breakup on telecom equipment sales. He later worked in project analysis.

At Touche Ross, which later merged with Deloitte, he was a management consultant with engagements in mutual fund accounting, systems design and implementation, bank operations, retailing, forensic accounting and merger analysis.

During a 14-year career at Merrill Lynch, Mark had a number of roles and responsibilities in the financial organization. These included: the estimation and implementation of new transfer pricing methodologies to enhance management reporting, profitability analysis (at product, client segment and individual client levels), business forecasting, product pricing, IT liaison and the design of sales force compensation schemes. As controller and chief of staff for the high net worth client marketing department, he also led efforts in market research and data mining.

Since 2001, Mark has been self-employed as a consultant, first to JPMorgan Chase and since then to an Internet entrepreneur. His book Career Confidential: An Insider’s Guide to Business uses case studies from his own experiences as lessons in career management, corporate culture and organizational politics. He has edited books in both fiction and nonfiction genres, as well as academic papers in economics. From 2008 to 2016 he was the Financial Careers Expert for About.com.